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Thanks for all your comments. We do understand that the loss of Google maps is disappointing for some and this wasn’t a decision we wanted to take, but sadly Google's licensing restrictions prevent us from offering Google maps alongside other services that we want to provide.

As we said in our announcement, this does mean we can now look at new opportunities that were previously not open to us, either for contractual or technical reasons. The first of these we announced yesterday and we’ll be making further announcements in due course as new developments are completed.

Thanks for your ongoing support.

This is great news; thanks for the OS maps.

It is of course disappointing to lose Google maps, but - as a UK user - it's great to have OS maps. I'm also an OS subscriber. Before, I used to toggle between Plotaroute and OS Maps browser tabs. Now I will just toggle between Plotaroute and Google Maps. If anything this will be easier because there's no need to sign into Google Maps. 

"Google's licensing restrictions prevent us from offering Google maps alongside other services that we want to provide." I don't think I understand this?  Can you explain?

Also... just because these are services you want to provide doesn't mean your users will find them useful or necessary.  Personally I only want Google maps as an overlay so I can compare roads (at times OSM lags behind Google) and also for the Streetview function.  If neither of those exist I will find it difficult to justify using (let alone paying premium for) Plotaroute. I don't know what extra things you wanted to do with Google maps but basically what you already provided worked fine for me -- others can speak for themselves. 

It is possible to update the satellite maps used. (Austria) Out of date for at least 5 years.

Very disappointed in losing google maps - but I do get it.  However, I am even a bit more disappointed that the new features you have added only benefit US users.  I never considered this a US focused product until now and this will definitely impact my decision to continue my subscription.

Marc.

i use this web app to make my track and load in another app connected with the treadmill that allow to run looking streetview routes , whitour gmaps and streetview split screen it's uselees to me . i think that i will quit here

I only purchased the premium membership because of Google Maps. I won't be renewing my premium membership tha tis due up next month. The other maps are useless to me. 

A number of you have asked if we can share more information about the reasons for removing Google maps from the desktop version of our premium route planner.  We can’t go into too much detail, but licensing restrictions were the main driver behind the decision, as well as technical limitations and risks. Google places a number of restrictions on how its maps can be used and we felt that these restrictions both limited us from developing new features that our users have been asking for and also caused an unacceptable level of risk to existing services. 

These are by no means the only issues, but just to give a few examples:

• We are not allowed to use Google maps as part of an app that provides route navigation, which is an area that our users most want us to develop.
  
  
• Google map directions don’t include road surface data that would be needed to develop ‘surface breakdown’ features requested by many of our users.
  
  
• If Google terminated its contract with us for any reason, this would have resulted not just in the loss of Google maps but in the complete and immediate loss of service for all our premium members, as Google map based applications can only be provided using Google’s own platform. While we believed this risk to be low, the impact of such a decision would have been catastrophic. 

There are numerous other issues and we were of course very aware that Google’s maps are popular, but ultimately we came to the conclusion that continuing to depend on Google maps was too risky and limiting, and therefore not a viable option.

We want to ensure we can provide a dependable service that is driven by what our users want rather than what our suppliers want and, although these will never be 100% aligned, we feel that this is the best direction for plotaroute and the majority of our users. We appreciate that this may feel like a backward step for some, but we ask you to bear with us as we continue to develop new features throughout 2021.

Obviously we appreciate that everyone’s needs are different and we will never be all things to all people, so if you feel that the loss of Google maps is something you can’t live with, we understand that and will be sorry to see you go. But we hope you’ll stick around and continue to benefit from the services we offer both now and in the future. 

There isn’t really any more we can add so we won’t comment on this any further, but hopefully that’s provided a bit more background to our decision. 

With removing GoogleMaps a scale map disappeared from plotaroute. 
Thanking you in anticipation of your action. 

Well, if you don't know what's going on, you know it's about money. 
In my opinion it makes no sense to have GoogleMap and to raise the user’s annual payment to very high level.
I prefer not to have GoogleMap and pay not too much. 

Taking this opportunity I would like to thank for the wonderful product you gave its users for a low price.

i would consider a premium plus subcrition for gmaps and streetview splitscreen other app that give this services for plan routes on tradmill like ifit cost 100 euro yearly 

Zenon - thanks for flagging up the missing map scale and also for your kind comments about plotaroute. We'll have a look to see if we can add the map scale in the next update, which should hopefully be early next week.

It's not a good news for french users. I am disappointed that the new features you have added only benefit US users. That's impact my decision to continue my subscription

Well, with what I considered a brilliant route planning service, and your decision to stop using street view, you have made my job 200% harder, why companies insist in modifying succesful formats astounds me, I will consider when my membership runs out whether to continue with your service or not

A backward step and the demise of a great service that I doubt if you consulted any customer over .... end off

Well, well, well.  I just opened up Plotaroute to plot, but first checked the Latest News.  Google Maps has gone !  Am I disappointed ?  No !

I long ago stopped plotting using Google Maps anyway.  For cycling and walking I found that OSM, Paths / Trails + other options work better.

I just tried Google streetview from the Map Inspector and this is a welcome improvement.  Much better than the previous arrangement for dragging the little man on the Plotaroute screen which didn't allow me to see which way the man was facing and didn't allow me to "drive" along the road as well as opening a separate window to use Google Streetview.   So this improvement means that, via Map Inspector, I can go straight to an exact location and I can then navigate better !

For the UK, Ordnance Survey Maps will be very useful as will be improvements to Paths / Trails.  Map Inspector > Streetview seems to work from all maps whilst on a road.  Very good !  The only downside is that I end up with lots of tabs open with Google Streetview, but closing them is not a problem.

Not only that , but I'm more than happy to be able to totally avoid all things Google ... apart from my phone, Youtube, Waze, Fitbit, Streetview etc 😕

This is really sad news since street views are critical for creating walking routes in other towns.  Saves a lot of exploratory time by car/foot.  Paths feature is also missing which is used a lot in city parks, etc.  Hopefully Map Inspector will increase in number. I used the one i found in a town and it required a lot of time/errors to get to the area i wanted to explore with street views.  One needs to print out a town map first.

I've tried to plot routes today and it simply will not work.  Wherever I try to plot I get the message window telling me "UNABLE TO CALCULATE ROUTE".  I get that with autoplot by road and sometiimes by bike.   If I choose "on foot" it will probably use the road I want it to use ... but then wander off somewhere that I really don't want to cycle ...

Hi Colin - have a look at the following FAQ for help with auto-plotting: Why can’t I auto-plot on a path shown on the map? Sounds like the point of origin may be not be tagged on OSM as accessible by bike if you can't auto-plot from this point to anywhere else. We've got a fix for the other issue that you raised about multiple street view tabs -this will be implemented next week. 

I'd already seen that note and I spent time yesterday updating roads near my house on OSM, but nothing changed on Plotaroute. 

Unless the updates are recognized by Plotaroute immediately, it makes no difference.  I saw another post saying it could be weeks before updates take effect on Plotaroute.  Is that still the case ?

Updates to our routing engine usually take place once a month. It takes around a week for us to regenerate a routing network for the whole world using the latest OSM maps and then transfer this to our routing servers, so it's not really practical to update more frequently than this. The next update will be early next month.